In vitro isolation of Plasmodium chabaudi merozoites by continuous flow ultrasound, cell sieving, concanavalin A-affinity chromatography and poly-L-lysine coated bead support columns

Techniques of merozoite isolation based on continuous flow ultrasound, cell sieving, Concanavalin A-affinity chromatography and cationically charged bead support columns were compared using the rodent malaria parasite, Plasmodium chabaudi. While each technique proved useful in isolating merozoites in reasonable numbers, the use of Con A-Sepharose 4B columns consistently provided the greatest numbers which were free of host cell contaminating membrane material and which were invasive to cells both in vivo and in vitro. In addition, Con A-Sepharose columns could be regenerated using α methyl-D mannoside. These results, when considered in light of merozoite isolation procedures used for other malarial species, indicated that the host-parasite model system had a bearing on which merozoite isolation technique was most likely to be successful.